50 in 50: Brandon Nimmo

Brandon
NimmoOF
/ Cheyenne East High SchoolBats-Throws:L-RHeight/Weight:6-3/175Hometown:Cheyenne,
Wyo.College
Commitment:ArkansasBirthdate:March
27, 1993SCOUTING
PROFILE: With
Nimmo in the same draft class as other uniquely-qualified high-school
outfield standouts such as Bubba Starling (Kansas) and Ben Roberts
(Montana), this has been an interesting spring for national scouts,
and also for regional scouts who have those remote areas. Nimmo
projects as a solid supplemental first-round pick, and should that
happen, he would become the highest draft pick ever from Wyoming.
Former University of Wyoming outfielder Bill Ewing has held that
distinction since 1976, when he was the NCAA Division I home-run
leader. Ewing was picked in the fourth round of that year’s draft
by the California Angels. Despite his remote Wyoming upbringing,
Nimmo is actually a very polished product for his age. With no formal
high-school baseball in Wyoming, most of Nimmo’s exposure to the
game has come while playing with Cheyenne’s Post 6 American Legion
team, which has won consecutive state titles and nine of the last 10.
Nimmo has led that team in hitting the last three years, and batted
.448-15-84 with 35 stolen bases in 35 attempts in 2010 as Post 6 went
67-12 to set a program record for most wins in a season. Nimmo
has had a couple of significant factors that have weighed in his
favor from what might be expected of a Wyoming high-school product.
His older brother, Bryce, was a three-year starter at Nebraska from
2006-2008, and had many similar tools, although he was only 5-foot-10
and 175 pounds, so the Nimmo name was already familiar to many
Midwest scouts. In addition, Nimmo made appearances on the national
showcase circuit last summer, including the 2010 Tournament of Stars
in North Carolina. Cheyenne Post 6 has also made numerous
out-of-state trips to Sun Belt locations, thus giving scouts a far
broader swath of games and at-bats to familiarize themselves with
Nimmo than they have with either Starling or Roberts. What they’ve
seen is a very talented all-around athlete with surprisingly-polished
hitting skills from the left side. Nimmo has very advanced barrel
skills, squares up pitches consistently and can drive them to the
gaps. His easy stride and plus speed (Nimmo is a Wyoming indoor state
track champion) result in numerous doubles and triples now that
should evolve into home runs in the future as he fills out and gets
stronger. His polish with the bat is the one thing that scouts have
repeatedly remarked on this spring after seeing Nimmo. While the rest
of Nimmo’s physical package doesn’t quite measure up to
Starling’s, it is very solid and separates him from most other
high-school center fielders in this draft. He’s a 6.5 runner in the
60, despite having had 2009 ACL surgery from a football injury. He
also has solid-average to fringy-plus arm strength. Nimmo is a 4.0
student, to boot, with a scholarship offer to Arkansas, but with the
type of attention he has been getting this spring from the scouting
community, it look like professional baseball is in his immediate
future.Projected
Draft Position: Late First Round to
mid-Sandwich Round